So sayeth Rich
Winter, pain-in-the-arse agent extraordinaire, about the last Washington Capitals
offer to Unrestricted Free Agent right wing Peter Bondra. Statements like
this are the reason the players and their union were on the short end of the
PR stick during the lockout. How is $1,500,000 dollars not a serious salary
offer for anyone? Try saying it out loud a few times: "One million, five
hundred thousand dollars for one year."

"One million...

Five hundred
thousand...

Dollars...

For eight months
of work."

Now start up
that internal dialogue and respond to yourself:

"One million,
five hundred thousand dollars for one season is not a serious amount of cash."

"One million,
five hundred thousand dollars..."

"...NOT.
SERIOUS!"

"One million,
five hundred...."

"But Bobby
Clarke's owners will let him pay us more! So will Lou's and some other owners
too! You're mean and unreasonable."

If you read this
site regularly, you are well aware that I was and remain firmly anti-salary
cap. You know that I have no problem with players negotiating the best possible
deal that they can get. That applies here too, of course. Peter Bondra is
welcome to use Rich Winter to maximize his earnings. He won't make friends
with any management, he will alienate the majority of the Washington fan base
that is begging him to come back, and he might even end up sitting out portions
of the pre-season, but that's Bondra's lookout. You know what you're going
to get when you hire Rich Winter to represent you.

I want Peter
Bondra to return. Without seeing the team's salary and budget, I can't say
how much the team "should" pay for him, but raising the bar a little
is probably wise. With an agent like Winter speaking for Bondra, though, you
can't give in. He'll seize on compromise, call it weakness, and ask for even
more. He'll threaten hold-outs, he'll 'leak' the negotiations to the press,
he'll put his tough-guy Super Agent image ahead of anything else. Bondra is
represented by Winter, not just in negotiations, but now in the press. Bondra
made a decision that Winter should speak for him to the Capitals, to the Devils,
to the Flyers, Flames, Thrashers, and Sharks. Bondra wants Winter to be his
public face for the media and the fans.

It seems that
Bondra made a lousy choice.

At 37, after
a disappointing playoff performance with an Ottawa team he should have excelled
for, Bondra can't play the Alexei Yashin game (who represented Yashin, by
the way?). To paraphrase the sorely missed Herb Brooks, Bondra doesn't have
enough talent left to get signed on talent alone. He can market his 25+ goal
potential and his still-very-good speed. He can point to his valuable special
teams play, laser beam slapshot, and above-average defense. He can do that,
but he won't make a $2.5 million dollar case on those: lots of guys match
some or even all of those talking points and cost a fair amount less. What
Bondra can play on is his solid-citizen, fan favorite image, his intangibles
and, in Washington, his iconic status. He needs to be the guy who played his
heart out after asking for a trade and then re-signed without public drama
after Christmas, then went out and dropped a hat trick on Toronto the night
the signing was announced. You've gotta market Peter Bondra as much as possible,
and Winter doesn't seem to be doing that.

Ask yourself,
if you were McPhee and in charge of rebuilding the Caps on the cheap, how
much would you pay for a 37-year old winger with good goal-scoring potential
but little playmaking skill? Now, how much would you pay to get Peter Bondra,
Mr. Capital, back so he can end his career in Washington after boosting fan
interest and affection for a season or two? Rich Winter's antics are forcing
McPhee to answer the first question, not the second. The Capitals are acting
in a reasonable fashion here. They are offering serious options and are apparently
open to some compromise. They aren't trying to turn public opinion against
Peter Bondra or the man who represents him.

Hey, Bondra,
come back. Tell Winter to keep it out of the press, to stop playing games,
and to work out the best possible deal. We want you in DC.